After snub, Gautam Gambhir in Delhi BJP's fresh list of 31 probable candidates

New Delhi, Mar 26: The BJP's Delhi unit has prepared a fresh list of 31 probable candidates for the seven Lok Sabha seats in the national capital, and has included the name of former cricketer Gautam Gambhir in it.

An earlier list of 21 probable candidates shortlisted by the election committee of the state BJP was turned down by the party's top leadership, which sought "more representative" nominations for final selection of candidates for the seats in the national capital.

"Ten more names have been added to the new list and the earlier names have been retained. It will be sent to the national leadership very soon," said a top leader of BJP's Delhi unit. The name of Gambhir who joined BJP days ago was missing in the first list. His name has been doing rounds for the New Delhi Lok Sabha seat, which is currently held by Meenakshi Lekhi. Besides Gambhir, names of state leaders Ravinder Gupta and Satish Upadhyay have also been added to the list of probables for the New Delhi seat.

Mohan Lal Gihara, Yogender Chandolia and Ravinder Inder Raj are fresh entrants in the list of North West Delhi (Reserved) constituency.

Former Delhi BJP Yuva Morcha president Nakul Bhardwaj is a probable from the East Delhi seat. The BJP's probable candidates from the New Delhi seat are Meenakshi Lekhi, Monika Arora, Rajesh Bhatia, Ravinder Gupta, Gautam Gambhir and Satish Upadhyay. The probables from the North West Delhi seat are sitting MP Udit Raj, Ravinder Inder Raj, Anita Arya, Ashok Pradhan, Mohan Lal Gihara and Yogender Chandolia. The list of probables from the West Delhi seat has names of sitting MP Parvesh Verma, Pawan Sharma and Kamaljeet Sehrawat.

In the North East Delhi seat, which is currently held by Delhi BJP president Manoj Tiwari, Satya Sharma and Mohan Singh Bisht are the two probables along with him. In the East Delhi seat, the probables are sitting MP Maheish Girri, Nakul Bhardwaj, OP Sharma and Kuljeet Chahal.

In the Chandni Chowk Lok Sabha seat, Union minister and sitting MP Harsh Vardhan, Sudhanshu Mittal and Ashok Goel are the party's probable candidates. The name of Union minister Vijay Goel is missing from the list of probales from Chandni Chowk. Goel is undertaking hectic campaign in favour of the party in Delhi.

Sitting MP Ramesh Bidhuri, Ranbir Singh Bidhuri, Brahm Singh Tanwar, Dharamveer Singh and Ruby Yadav are the BJP's probable candidates from the South Delhi seat.

On Friday, the Delhi BJP election committee had shortlisted three names each for the seven Lok Sabha seats in the national capital, amid protests by party members over celebrities joining the organisation for tickets ahead of the polls. Sources claimed the central leadership was "unhappy" with its Delhi unit objecting to celebrities being considered to contest the polls and directed it to rework the list of candidates it had submitted.

"The central leadership wants more recommendations from the city, as they feel that Delhi being a key unit should play a more proactive role," a party functionary had said Monday. BJP currently holds all the seven seats in Delhi and has a daunting task of retaining its 2014 tally, amid possibilities of alliance between the AAP and the Congress for the coming national elections. Delhi will vote on May 12.

PTI